The 10th round of talks between Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan over the Grand Ethiopians Renaissance Dam (GERD) will kick off on Sunday in Khartoum.
The four-day tripartite meetings are aimed at reviewing the joint technical proposal submitted by the two French consultancy firms on GERD;s potential impact on the downstream countries, Sudan and Egypt.
The three countries have received copies of the joint proposal submitted by the French Artelia and BRL groups.
The new round of talks between the three countries is to dicsuaa the financial costs of the technical studies and to reach a unified proposal that reflects their views.
France’s Artelia group will conduct 70 percent of the studies while BRL group will conduct the remaining, Egypt’s water and irrigation minister Hossam Moghazy told reports on Saturday.
Moghazy said that the technical studies should be concluded before the end of this year.
The $4 billion dam is being constructed on the Blue Nile with a capacity of 74 billion cubic meters, and is expected to generate electrical power of up to 6,000 megawatts.
Egypt has previously voiced its concern that the dam could reduce its annual share of over 56 billion cubic meters of Nile water. Addis Ababa, however, has claimed that the dam is necessary for its development, and will not harm downstream countries.
